This is the 26th #WILTW
So this week marks the six-month anniversary of #WILTW (full list here). I get a chance to reflect on reflections I suppose!
It’s been a really interesting process which I think has definitely been worthwhile for me although recent feedback varying in its utility for others 🙂
#WILTW came from a blog I wrote in the first week of being consultant. It spoke to the time honoured quote: “You never stop learning”. I thought that formalising my (perceived) learning in the form of a blog may encapsulate it. Firstly in a way that I could easily document (useful for continuing professional development) but also to help me not waste it. As a result I have discovered a few interesting things…
- I have realised on a week-by-week basis it’s actually quite difficult to learn something completely new. Most of #WILTW is about validating what I know rather than develop any entirely new skill or mindset.
- As a result I have sometimes struggled because reflection shouldn’t be forced. If I am honest there are a few posts which started as: “I have no idea what I am going to say this week….”
- But being disciplined about having a regular time (usually Friday afternoon) has been incredibly useful in not letting things drift completely. Just the time to sit and think about the last week is valuable.
- Finally when you do truly learn something new in a clinical context it can be quite difficult to discuss it in a open forum without breaching confidentiality. This was an unexpected challenge, although with some imaginative story telling, not an impossible hurdle to overcome.
For me the process has been a valuable one and something I will persist with. I am neither a Jane Austen nor a J.K.Rowling but I hope these short records will stand the test of time and at the very least give me a record of the direction my time as a consultant has taken me.
What have you learnt this week? #WILTW